


recipe for disaster

by jumbleofthoughts



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Could Be Canon, Gen, Marauders, Marauders' Era, Seriously this has no plot, lily secretly enjoys a little bit of mischief, literally just the marauders and lily being friends
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-20
Updated: 2019-01-20
Packaged: 2019-10-13 02:56:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,626
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17479898
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jumbleofthoughts/pseuds/jumbleofthoughts
Summary: "𝘓𝘪𝘭𝘺 𝘌𝘷𝘢𝘯𝘴 𝘸𝘢𝘴𝘯’𝘵 𝘴𝘶𝘳𝘦 𝘸𝘩𝘢𝘵 𝘴𝘩𝘦 𝘸𝘢𝘴 𝘦𝘹𝘱𝘦𝘤𝘵𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘵𝘰 𝘴𝘦𝘦 𝘸𝘩𝘦𝘯 𝘴𝘩𝘦 𝘸𝘢𝘭𝘬𝘦𝘥 𝘪𝘯𝘵𝘰 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘎𝘳𝘺𝘧𝘧𝘪𝘯𝘥𝘰𝘳 𝘤𝘰𝘮𝘮𝘰𝘯 𝘳𝘰𝘰𝘮, 𝘣𝘶𝘵 𝘪𝘵 𝘤𝘦𝘳𝘵𝘢𝘪𝘯𝘭𝘺 𝘸𝘢𝘴𝘯’𝘵 𝘑𝘢𝘮𝘦𝘴 𝘗𝘰𝘵𝘵𝘦𝘳 𝘸𝘪𝘵𝘩 𝘩𝘪𝘴 𝘯𝘰𝘴𝘦 𝘴𝘵𝘶𝘤𝘬 𝘪𝘯 𝘢 𝘣𝘰𝘰𝘬. "When Lily Evans encounters silence as she enters the Gryffindor common room, she knows that something is off. She intends to find out what it is.





	recipe for disaster

**Author's Note:**

> Hello! This is my first work on ao3, and my first work in the Harry Potter fandom. I just love these characters and have wanted to write something about them for the longest time, so I decided to give it a go and post it here.
> 
> I hope you enjoy!

Lily Evans wasn’t sure what she was expecting to see when she walked into the Gryffindor common room, but it certainly wasn’t James Potter with his nose stuck in a book. Especially on this particular day, on which the same James Potter had been displaying quite an obvious desire to get himself into trouble.

So, you can imagine her surprise when she told the Fat Lady the house password (it was  _ haruspex  _ at the time), and walked through the corridor in complete silence.

Silence, in case you didn’t know, was not something commonly found in the Gryffindor house. 

Raising an eyebrow in confusion and intrigue, Lily walked faster. When she reached the common room, she was greeted by the sight of James Potter, Sirius Black, Peter Pettigrew, and Remus Lupin (bloody inseparable, these four) sat in a position that seemed to be second nature to them.

James was sat horizontally on the largest couch in the common room, with one leg straight and one hanging off of the side. Peter was sitting on the floor in front of the couch and to the right of James’ leg. His legs were curled beside him and he was resting his head on James’ knee. Remus was sitting cross-legged on the left side of James' leg, using the couch as support for his back. Sirius was lying on his back to the left of Remus with his legs bent upward and his head on Remus’ left knee. 

While this position (or some variation of it) was where Lily often found the four boys, their current behavior seemed incredibly strange to her. On any other day, Sirius and James would be teasing each other relentlessly, and Remus would be biting his lip in an obvious attempt to contain his laughter. Peter, ever the peacemaker, would try to get the two to stop insulting each other (no matter how playful it was), but would often end up teasing the both of them rather than getting them to stop.

(Lily would never forget the first time she heard Peter teasing James. The boy was quiet, but he knew exactly how to make the one and only  _ James Potter _ speechless, and that was something she had to respect.)

But on this particular day, there was nothing. No teasing, no laughing, no speaking whatsoever. James, Peter, and Sirius were all reading books, and Remus was writing something on a piece of parchment that was on top of a book resting on his right knee. The only noises that could be heard were those of flipping pages, a quill being dipped into an inkpot, and the occasional whispered comments from one boy to another.

In all of the years that Lily had known them, she had never seen the four boys look so focused when around each other.

They had to be up to something.

Grateful that they had been oblivious to her arrival and hopeful that they would stay that way, Lily kept quiet and walked closer to them.

“Hey, Moons, what do you think about this?” Peter asked, lifting his head off of James’ knee and holding his book toward Remus.

Remus put the quill he was holding beside him as he took the book from Peter and read it. Eventually, he handed it back to him, smiling.

“That is entirely possible,” Remus said quietly, laughing under his breath as he picked up his quill. “We might actually be able to make that work.”

At that point, Lily’s suspicions were confirmed: they  _ were _ up to something. 

Before Peter could even put his head back on James’ knee, she decided to intervene.

“What, may I ask, are you four doing?” she questioned, stepping into their view.

James’ head snapped up from his book, and it took all of Lily’s willpower not to laugh as she watched his face begin to turn as red as the couch he was sitting on. Peter looked equally as terrified as he began to quickly shut his book and try to hide it. Sirius lifted his head from Remus’ knee as he turned to face Lily, closing his book just as quickly as Peter did his. Remus, clearly the calmest one at that given time, widened his eyes and tensed up, but he quickly relaxed and put a smile on his face.

“Oh, hello, Lily,” he said. “We didn’t hear you come in.”

“I noticed as much,” Lily replied, smiling. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen you four so quiet out of your own volition.”

James laughed, but anyone with a working pair of ears could tell that it was forced. “Probably because we haven’t ever been this quiet before,” he said.

Sirius opened his mouth, clearly ready to protest, but then closed it. “He’s right.”

Lily, not ignoring the fact that they still hadn’t answered her question, took another step forward. “Would you care to explain  _ why _ you four are so quiet all of a sudden?”

She watched as the boys looked at each other frantically, clearly trying to figure out what to say. Eventually, James spoke.

“We’re just trying to figure out a charm,” he said, sitting up straighter and pushing his glasses up on the bridge of his nose.

Lily raised her eyebrow, not convinced. “A charm that requires multiple books to figure out?”

James’ eyes widened, he paused, then he nodded. “Well, it’s not exactly the  _ easiest  _ charm.”

Lily, smiling, crossed her arms. “Well, if you needed help with a charm, you should have just asked me. If I recall correctly, you’ve never had a problem doing that before.”

James, obviously not expecting her response, couldn’t seem to find anything else to say.

Peter, the supportive friend that he was, tried to salvage James’ excuse. “Well, we’re not sure if it’s an  _ actual _ charm or not,” he said, turning to face Lily. “It’s more of an... idea at the moment.”

“Right,” Sirius added, keeping a straight face. “It’s just an idea. We’re not even sure if it would work, or if the charm we’re imagining even exists. That’s why we’re looking in all of these books.”

Lily looked at the books that surrounded the four boys. Some were opened, some were closed, and some (much to her annoyance) had the corners of some pages folded down.

“Oh?” she asked. “And who’s idea was this?”

The boys looked at one another, and Lily could tell that none of them wanted to answer that question. Sirius nudged Remus, and he rolled his eyes.

“It’s a group effort,” he said. “There, Sirius, was that so hard?”

“You’re better at explaining these things than the rest of us, Remus,” Peter said.

“Peter, I literally just said that this was a collective idea.”

James, putting his hand on Remus’ shoulder, pitched in. “You make a good point, but you have to remember that none of us would have thought to word it that way.”

Sirius laughed, brushing a strand of his black hair out of his eyes. “If we’re being honest, we probably would have just blamed it on James.”

Lily laughed while James scoffed, but his voice sounded anything but offended when he said, “You’re not wrong.”

“So,” Lily started, “what you’re saying is that you have an idea-”

“-Yes,” Peter interrupted.

“That none of you completely understand-”

“-Unfortunately, yes,” Remus said quietly.

“And yet, you’re trying to figure it out anyway?”

Sirius winked. “You’ve got it, Evans.”

Lily rolled her eyes. “Everything about this situation screams ‘recipe for disaster.’”

“That it does,” James said, smiling. “Want to join?”

Lily’s eyes widened as she laughed and took a step backward, watching as Sirius punched James in the arm.

“As curious as I am, I’ve learned that it’s a lot safer to be a victim than a witness when it comes to you four.”

Remus laughed. “I wish I could say the same.”

Sirius and James mocked offense, and Peter laughed. “Time to add another thing to the list of reasons why Lily is the smartest person we know,” he said, smiling.

Lily laughed. “I’ll accept that. Good luck with… whatever it is that you’re doing.”

“Does that mean that you’re encouraging it?” James asked, sitting up straight and winking.

“Absolutely not,” Lily said, beginning to walk into the girls’ dorm. “But if someone happened to suggest that you try reading ‘ _ Charms for Champions’  _ by Sharian Estelar, I wouldn’t stop you from doing so.” She winked as she left, watching James’ face flush red and Remus’ eyes widen. Peter hit Remus in the arm, saying, “Write that down, quickly!”

Remus laughed as he dipped his quill into his inkpot and began to scribble down what Lily assumed to be the title of the book she had suggested to them. James reopened his book and kept reading while Peter and Sirius looked over Remus’ shoulders as he wrote. The four boys began talking to each other excitedly, suddenly coming to a collective decision to completely ignore Lily’s presence. 

Even as she closed the door to the girls’ dorm, Lily heard the boys as they talked, laughed, and continued behaving in their own strange sort of normal.

And even though she was still oblivious to what the boys were planning, she couldn’t help but feel strangely happy that she had been able to assist them. There was a certain spark of  _ something  _ in the group that she only saw in them on extremely rare occasions (whether it was happiness, malice, creativity, playfulness, or anything else, Lily couldn’t tell), and to be the cause of that spark igniting in them, even for a little while, brought joy to her. 

Besides, as long as no one gets hurt in the process, maybe a little mischief in Lily’s life wouldn’t be such a bad thing.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! Please feel free to leave a comment telling me what you thought of this, or ways that you think I could improve my writing. (I know that I still have a ways to go.) 
> 
> Until next time!


End file.
